


Disturbances in an Elf's Life

by velocitygrass



Category: Stargate Atlantis RPS
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Elf, Humor, Loss of Virginity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-08
Updated: 2010-10-08
Packaged: 2017-10-12 12:43:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/124937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/velocitygrass/pseuds/velocitygrass
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joe is a very content elf on most days. He has to put up with leprechauns trying to steal or destroy his precious liquid, but that turns out to be a minor disturbance compared to the human who suddenly shows up close to his hut. Shooting a documentary about squirrels, David is much too close for comfort, and he seems to take a special interest in Joe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Disturbances in an Elf's Life

**Author's Note:**

> Please check out Antares' [wonderful coverart](http://antares04a.livejournal.com/38446.html)!
> 
> Warnings: Abuse/disregard of Irish/Nordic folklore and fantasy conventions, including kleptomaniac leprechauns
> 
> I doubt that Joe would want to have anything to do with this story, let alone credit, but I will gladly ~~blame him~~ admit that this story was inspired by certain twitters of his :)
> 
> This is entirely a work of fiction. Except for the kleptomaniac leprechauns. They're out to get you!

When Joe woke up, he realized he'd fallen asleep in his rocking chair again. He lifted his arms and moved his shoulders, noisily working the kinks out of his back. He let his arms drop and scratched his belly. The liquid had been really good the night before, running smoothly down his throat and warming him from the inside. He sighed happily at the memory.

Unfortunately it had been the last of that batch, so he probably should work on refining what he had brewing in the cellar at the moment. And not just the half-assed way that he'd done the last few times either. Sure, the liquid could be almost as good without going through the trouble of finding the right ingredients, and the fire cast did its thing, but the liquid last night had been glorious.

Joe grumbled at the work ahead of him, but the result would be worth it. He relieved himself of the liquid and set off to find what he needed.

The wind was blowing quite a bit today, but since the sky was cloudless, it was a welcome fresh breeze in the warmth of the sunlight. Clover was easy enough to find. He didn't even have to cast a rune to find a four-leafed one. He pocketed the clover and went on to get some sea water. He'd extracted parts of the cliffs a few hundred years ago, shortly after he'd settled down here, so there was something that could pass as a path down to the narrow strip of beach between the cliffs and the water.

He made it down without any mishaps. He'd learned to be careful after falling down the cliffs while under the influence of liquid once. Casting healing runes on yourself was no fun. Joe made a face at the memory. Waves were crashing into the beach. Very nice waves. Joe was tempted to forget about refining and get his water board. But no, the taste of yesterday's liquid still burning in his stomach kept him going. He could take the board out on a ride tomorrow.

After getting the sea water, a lucky beetle, and the ingredients he needed for a rain cast, Joe lay down in the grass to replenish. He closed his eyes, enjoying, as always, how nature gave him what he needed to survive. After he was fully rejuvenated, Joe set up the stones, trying to remember the order in which they needed to be laid. The last few times he'd captured a rainbow, he'd simply taken the opportunity when it had rained and the sun came through, but the last weeks had been relatively mild and dry.

It took him two tries to get it right, but he managed to conjure up a little cloud that started shedding drops of rain. Once the rainbow flickered into life, he quickly cast the second rune to capture it. Ha! The rainbow was the hardest part of refinement. Well, that and casting the embers rune, which was a pain in the butt compared to a simple fire cast, but that would have to be done in his cellar.

He made his way back to his hut. He didn't even get out the liquid he'd brought with him, holding on to the taste of last night's much superior version instead. Oh yes, this would definitely be worth it.

Back at his hut he carefully added the ingredients to the liquid in the small barrels. The lucky beetle was a bit stubborn and didn't want to kiss the surface of the liquid without special incentive, but after Joe removed one leaf of the clover and spruced it up with a touch of liquid, the lucky beetle did as asked.

The liquid began to get its golden glow when Joe released the rainbow into it. He grinned in anticipation. He could feel that this would be a fantastic batch. He licked his lips, concentrating on getting the runes right for the embers cast. He didn't want to ruin everything by making a mistake now. He actually went ahead and practiced on an old barrel of mediocre liquid that he didn't care if he ruined. It worked on the first try, though, so Joe did the same to his latest batch and watched in satisfaction as the liquid started to emanate that little spark that told him he'd gotten it just right.

For a moment, he basked in the little hum of both his heart and the liquid as it brewed towards perfection.

When he came back out, he settled down in his rocking chair again. He opened the little bag that lay ready at its feet, got out the pipe, and filled it with dried leaves. Then he lit it with a simple cast, enjoying the evening as the sun set down.

~~

Joe woke up, realizing he'd fallen asleep in his rocking chair again. The pipe had slipped to the ground. No burn marks today, thankfully. And they were easy to deal with anyway. Unlike, say, a house burning down to the ground. He looked over to the slipshod job he'd done with the replacement hut. Sure, none of the walls were straight, and the windows and door didn't align perfectly with where they'd been set in, but it had stood for the last two hundred years, which wasn't too bad, if he said so himself.

And he wasn't too much inside anyway. There was a table with a chair and a bed, but ever since the fire, he came outside to smoke. He'd even set up a little moat around his rocking chair. If something destroyed his new hut, it wasn't going to be his own pipe at least. And since he liked to end the day with a nice pipe full, he ended up falling asleep in his rocking chair more often than not.

He worked out the kinks in his back, which were always the result of falling asleep outside, when he noticed something dropping from his lap. He leaned forward to see what it was. A little lump of gold.

Oh no.

Joe jumped out of the rocking chair and rushed into the cellar. Seeing the chaos down there, with barrels lying emptied, lumps of gold scattered throughout, and a distinct lack of golden glow even in the barrels that were still standing, Joe cursed loudly. "Damn them! Why now of all times?"

They'd left him in peace for over a month. Which might have tipped him off that it wasn't going to last. Though they were completely unpredictable, of course, showing up once a week sometimes for a month and then staying away for several months on end. Damn leprechauns.

They'd ruined all of yesterday's work. They'd even gotten some of the lesser liquid. It had been years since they'd gone on such a spree of destruction. Usually they just came and stole something. Argh, there went his plans for the day. Now he actually needed to prepare some new base of the liquid. That would take all day. And it would need to rest for a few days to get ready for refinement.

Joe set the barrels straight and collected the lumps of gold, shoving them into a new little bag. He had a growing collection of those. There was only so much gold that he could actually use in the refinement process. The rest was just taking up space.

Grumbling about the leprechauns, he set out to gather everything he needed to make the base of the liquid.

~~

The next day he woke up in his rocking chair again. His back really hurt from yesterday's work. Since he couldn't get the floating cast to work even on the fifth try, he had carried everything by hand. The loss of his rune book was one of the worst things about the fire two hundred years ago. He had a hard time remembering some of the runes. There was a rune for remembering that he could cast, but that one was a _real_ pain in the ass. It was simple to remember—anything else would have defeated the purpose—but it took a week of preparation, so he hadn't bothered to do it for at least fifty years.

He cast a simple rune to ease the pain in his back and then went into the cellar to get some of the liquid that had survived the leprechaun invasion. It wasn't the really good stuff, but it would sweeten the wait for the base of the liquid to be done. The way his back still smarted, he didn't think he was up to taking the water board to the beach either.

Oh no. This couldn't be. They wouldn't dare!

Except that, of course, the leprechauns had no sense at all of what was appropriate. If they left him alone for a while, it was only because they were so easily distracted that nothing could hold their attention for more than a moment. Except that now they'd decided to ransack his cellar two days in a row. Of course, they'd gotten nearly all of the base of the liquid. Joe was near tears—of rage. Those little bastards.

There was no way in hell that he was going to carry all that sea water again today, so he sat down near the cliffs and sulked for most of the morning. After replenishing, though, he had an idea. Why not dig out the old rune that would allow him to trap the leprechauns?

He sincerely doubted they'd show up a third day in a row. And at this point, there was not much left to ruin, but Joe still warmed to the idea. It wasn't about capturing them of course. You couldn't truly capture leprechauns. If you held them for longer than a day, they vanished into thin air and escaped. Which was why he didn't bother with it usually. But right now, the thought of seeing their look of surprise and knowing they couldn't get away for at least a day was good enough for Joe.

It sure beat sulking and wallowing in self-pity.

~~

Ah, that was more like it. Joe woke up in his bed, feeling refreshed and at ease all over. His body really preferred to rest horizontally. He got out of bed and stretched himself, feeling no pain at all. He went outside and took a deep breath, inhaling the morning breeze. Yep, he was ready for the day. He'd give the floating cast another try, and if it didn't work, he'd just go ahead and carry the water again, and then while the base of the liquid rested, he could try the remembering cast.

He was about to open the trunk with some of his rune stones when he noticed the lump of gold near the steps down his cellar. They wouldn't... Joe was gleeful at the prospect of having caught them. Well, that was what you got when you tried the same mischief three days in a row. Which was really rather unusual. He frowned for a moment but then shrugged it off.

He nearly skipped downstairs, rubbing his hands together in anticipation. Downstairs he found a beautiful image of poetic justice. Fergus and Flynn lay unconscious on the ground, knocked out by the bags of gold that he'd set up as his trap. He put away the gold and picked them up, carrying them by the neck, one in each hand.

Upstairs their confinement waited for them. It was a simple cast. There was no point in doing anything fancy when they'd be gone in a day anyway. He dropped them down on the wooden base and got to work on the floating cast while he waited for them to wake up.

~~

"Hey!" Flynn was the first to rise to consciousness.

Joe ignored her just to be annoying.

"You know we'll escape," she said.

Joe came closer and grinned down at her. "Oh, I know," he said. "Hope I'm not _inconveniencing_ you," he added, his grin widening.

Flynn poked Fergus with the tip of her foot until he stirred. "What happened?" His eyes widened when he took in his surroundings.

"Yeah, sorry about that," Joe said insincerely. "I was bored yesterday after my whole cellar was _destroyed_. Didn't know what to do with myself, so I cast an escape-me-not. Was that a problem?" he asked innocently.

"We'll be out in a day anyway," Fergus said agreeably.

"Yes, but you're here for the day. Hmm, what should I do with you?" Joe put his finger on his mouth in a clear thinking pose. It wasn't as if he could hurt them, but he could sure as hell _annoy_ them.

"Why don't you let us out?" Flynn asked.

"So _now_ you want to get away?" Joe asked. "Three days in a row," he said, adding emphasis to every single word.

"We just wanted to tell you about _him_ ," Flynn said.

Joe's eyes narrowed. There was no him. There was absolutely no one around here anywhere, which was precisely the reason that he'd settled down here in the first place. "Who 'him'?" he asked.

"The human," Fergus said.

Joe's face darkened. Humans were the bane of his existence. That strange group of people with their rolling transport huts the summer before had been torture. They'd called it shooting a moovee, though he hadn't heard any shots and he had no idea what kind of being a moovee was supposed to be. He'd spent most of the time that they'd stayed in the next valley around his hut casting protective runes. Time that could have been spent cultivating liquid! No. Humans were always trouble. Even when they weren't actively killing things.

"Only one?" Joe asked. One would be bad enough, but at least it was easier to keep an eye on a single human.

"Yes. He walks around all day, checking strange little boxes," Fergus said.

"That's not true," Flynn disagreed. "He sometimes stays in his tent. And he talks into a stone sometimes," she added, giggling.

"What?" Joe asked. He was used to humans doing strange things—even though he tried and managed to avoid them as a general rule. But a human talking to stones was nothing he'd ever observed.

"It's a flat shiny black stone," Fergus added, nodding. "He carries it around with him."

Joe wouldn't put it past them to make a few things up, but he was certain that they wouldn't joke about the human. He quickly cast the rune to lower the barrier of the confinement.

"Woohoo, you let us out!" Flynn said, running around his feet.

"Don't make me regret it," he warned.

"Joehoe is grumpy," Fergus sing-songed, jumping off the base of the confinement.

Joe took a deep breath and pocketed a few useful rune stones from his trunk. "So where is this human?" he asked.

~~

Joe managed not to trip on his way over the meadow up the hill, which was a small miracle given that Flynn and Fergus were running around his legs as if they were in a contest of who could be the most annoying. As far as Joe was concerned, they were both winning.

When they came to the highest point of the hill and could look down the other side, Joe saw the human and where he'd set up camp. There was one of those moving huts and a tent. He'd also set up a table and a chair, though at the moment he was... talking into what appeared to be a stone.

"I told you," Fergus said.

"Shhhh," Joe warned him, lying down in the grass. The human was quite a bit further away. Joe looked back down the hill where they'd come from. The view to his hut was protected by trees, but Joe still wasn't happy. The human would just have to take a little walk up the hill and down the other side to stumble onto his hut.

Damn. He'd have to cast an invisibility rune. That would take most of the first spring morning dew he'd collected since the last summer. Humans! Joe silently cursed and got out a little bag with protective runes that he always had on hand for when he needed them. He hoped it wouldn't come to that, but you could never be too careful with humans.

He slowly inched a bit closer, using the shrubbery to hide from the human's view. When he was as close as he was comfortable getting, he decided to cast a rune for a flying ear. He wanted to know _what_ the human was saying to the stone.

He cast the rune and directed it towards the human.

"... know that it's impossible.... I have no idea. It was just gone when I checked this morning.... I told you I don't know. There's nobody here to steal them. Unless the squirrels got them.... Very funny. I'll rearrange the cameras so that they'll point at each other. Maybe that way I'll catch the culprit.... Well, then I'll catch that! Bye.... Yeah, I will."

The human stopped talking and put the stone back in his pocket. Joe was willing to bet he'd been talking to another human through it somehow. He vaguely remembered seeing something like this before, though it hadn't been a stone but a weirdly shaped thing that had one bit near the mouth to speak into and one bit near the ear, presumably to hear the answer.

What worried him more though were those 'cameras'. They seemed to have the ability to capture things in one way or another. And then there was the whole matter of the disappearance of one of those cameras. Joe had a pretty good idea what happened with it. "Okay, so what did you do with it?" he asked, turning towards Flynn and Fergus—only to find them gone.

"Damn it!" Joe cursed. You really couldn't leave these two alone for even a second.

He scanned the area around the human, who'd walked a bit further away towards one of the little boxes. It was probably one of the cameras. But neither Fergus nor Flynn were in sight. Joe spotted four other cameras, but the leprechauns weren't there. He looked towards the rolling hut, then the tent. It all looked undisturbed, except... There was some movement in the tent!

Joe saw Fergus opening up the tent flap, carelessly flipping a lump of gold in the air. He caught it and put it into a bag. Joe silently urged them to just get out of the way. The human wouldn't be able to do anything to them, but if they started swarming the area to find them again, they might stumble upon Joe's hut and gone would be the peaceful life he'd had for the last hundreds of years. He was sick and tired of having to move because humans took over an area.

Fergus made no move to get away. The human was quite far away, so he was unlikely to see him, but Joe was still anxious. Then, finally, Flynn appeared at the entrance of the tent, lumping out a huge pillow. What the hell?

Joe was tempted to go over there and drag them away by their ears. This was not the time to go hunting for treasure to steal! And it was just a pillow, even though a pretty large and comfortable looking one. Joe watched as they dragged the pillow over the meadow. Fortunately the grass stood back up relatively quickly. But they still left a pretty visible trail.

Joe shook his head and made his way closer to them. When they arrived at the shrubs, he asked, "What the hell were you thinking?"

"Pillow!" Flynn said, letting herself drop on the pillow.

"You don't think he'll notice?" Joe asked her.

"He'll think it was the squirrels," Fergus said brightly.

"No, he—" Joe stopped himself. There was no point arguing with them. "Okay. What did you do with that 'camera' thing?"

They looked at him blankly.

"The... box that you took," Joe clarified.

"He's got more of them," Flynn said.

"I know, but what did you do with the one you took?"

"We took it home," Fergus said.

"Do you want to see?" Flynn asked, sitting up on the pillow.

"Yes!" Joe said. It was hard to get into their cave without their permission. It had never been worth the bother to him to steal something back, but he wanted to take a closer look at this camera that the human was missing.

Flynn and Fergus jumped up excitedly. When they started dragging the pillow on, Joe picked it up. "No worries," he said at their look. "I'll just carry it for you."

"Okay," they said in unison, skipping away.

Joe followed them with a sigh.

~~

Even though they lived in a cave, for some reason light was coming in from somewhere. Joe didn't ask how that worked. Instead he took in the chaos that they called home. He recognized several of the items as his own. Other things looked distinctly human.

"You're not going into town stealing, are you?" he asked suspiciously.

"Only shiny things," Flynn said throwing herself onto the pillow again.

"And food," Fergus added jumping onto the pillow next to her, making her move up and down as her side of the pillow was filled and unfilled. Flynn giggled while Fergus squealed.

Okay, time to look for the camera. Thankfully, they didn't ever seem to put anything away, so he found what had to be the camera right next to the entrance. At least it looked like the other box-shaped things Joe had seen around the human's tent. Though, upon closer inspection, it wasn't really a box. There was no lid to open that he could see, and at the front of the main body was something that looked vaguely like an eye.

Joe recalled the human talking about the camera catching something. If these were like eyes, maybe he'd meant "seeing" instead of a physical capture. He carefully poked the eye with his finger, but it didn't do anything. Hmmm. Since the thing wasn't very large, he decided to pick it up. There were little nubs around it and some little symbols. He put a finger on a nub. It was movable. He tried a few more when suddenly the eye came to life.

Joe nearly dropped the whole thing. A shining red light came from a little hole. He looked closer at the eye and it moved! This wasn't good. He put down the camera and threw the first piece of cloth he could find—a curtain; he had no idea what Fergus and Flynn wanted to do with that in a _cave_ , but he'd go crazy looking for rhyme and reason in what they were doing—over the object. The light was still shining, though, so he feared it might still watch them.

"We should return it," he mumbled.

"Noooo!" came the double cry from the pillow. "It's ours."

"Stealing it doesn't make it yours!" Not that they'd care about that. Joe tried a different approach. "Look, you've got the pillow, which is a lot better. I think this is dangerous. I think it might be watching us, and you don't want humans to come here and take back all the shiny things, do you?"

"They wouldn't!" Flynn said.

"They couldn't!" Fergus added.

"But they could try. What if you're out and about, raiding my cellar again?"

They grinned. Joe glared at them. "I'm taking this, end of story."

"Spoilsport, spoilsport. Joehoe is a spoilsport," they both sang.

Joe growled threateningly at them, then took the camera. For good measure, he also took the first of his things that he caught sight of: A stirring stick that he had long ago made a replacement for, but it was the principle of the matter.

By the time he left the cave, they'd already forgotten about him, going back to playing with the pillow.

~~

Joe fell into the rocking chair after finally finishing all the protective runes he could cast. The human shouldn't be able to find his hut now unless he walked straight into it. And Joe had also prepared a few rune stones for his own protection, just in case.

He sighed heavily. Another day wasted, and he didn't even have base of liquid resting in the cellar, except for one lonely barrel that Flynn and Fergus had overlooked. He'd placed the camera where he suspected Flynn and Fergus had taken it from, based on the layout of the other ones.

The human had been in his tent, so Joe had managed to drop it off and get away without being seen. He somehow doubted it was the end of the matter though. He had a feeling he'd see more of this human, whether he wanted to or not.

Joe picked up his pipe and filled it with dried leaves. At least he still had this.

~~

Joe woke up the next morning to two sets of little hands tugging on his fingers and little boots kicking his ankles.

"Stop that!" he said, before opening his eyes.

"He's awake," Flynn shouted unnecessarily.

"I am _now_ ," Joe grumbled. "Why are you here again? Forgot the last barrel in the cellar?"

"It's the human," Fergus said. "He's up and about, moving the boxes with eyes around!"

"I know that. He's trying to catch you stealing, so you better stay away from him," he warned them.

"But he put up stuff for us," Flynn said.

Joe sat up straight and narrowed his eyes. He picked Flynn up and set her down on his knee. "What stuff? And why for _you_?"

"Who else would it be for?" she said.

Fergus climbed up the rocking chair onto his other knee. "It's _food_ stuff," he said. "I can smell it."

"And it's shiny," Flynn added earnestly.

Okay, that really did sound like it was made for them. Which made Joe even more suspicious. "You should leave it alone," he said. They had after all come here first, which was a good sign.

"No!" Fergus said, jumping to the ground. "But we'll share," he said generously.

"I don't want it!" Joe said emphatically.

"Then it's all for us," Flynn said, jumping down as well.

"Just wanted to let you know," Fergus added, and then they were off.

"Hey! No, wait!" But it was too late. "Be careful," he called after them, though he knew it was useless. Joe could only get up and hurry after them.

~~

Flynn and Fergus were careful insofar as they first tried to steal from the camera the farthest away from the human. Joe watched the whole thing from behind the shrubs. Looking at what the human had done, he could only conclude that Flynn and Fergus were right. The little gifts _were_ set up specifically for them.

They were placed directly in line of the eye of the camera. Joe was really sure now that those things could see and somehow relate what they saw to the human. The human was walking around the area from camera to camera. He didn't even look surprised when he found the little shiny gifts gone. Instead he looked excited. He picked up the camera and extracted something from it that Joe couldn't see from his position.

Joe had a really, really bad feeling about this, but he knew there was no appealing to common sense when it came to leprechauns. When they'd finally stolen—or actually since they did seem to be intended for them, maybe taken was the right word—all of their gifts, they joined Joe behind the shrubs.

"Hmmm," Fergus sighed, taking in the smell of the gifts.

Joe didn't understand his obsession with food. He greatly preferred restoring his energy by replenishing.

Flynn tugged on the shiny little clump until it opened. "Oooh," she said. "We can keep the shiny and eat it too!" She demonstrated by unwrapping the brown little clump, throwing it in the air and capturing it with her mouth.

"Hey, wait, that might be—" Joe began, only to be interrupted by Fergus, who'd unwrapped his own gift and stuck it in his mouth.

"Ohhhh. Soooo gooooood," Fergus said, licking his fingers.

Since he didn't immediately drop to the ground, Joe thought it was probably safe for them. Then again, he knew of no way to kill a leprechaun, so even if the 'gifts' had been prepared in a way, they might just not work on leprechauns. Elves were a different matter, though, so Joe wouldn't even touch them.

He didn't for one second believe that the human had left the gifts out of the kindness of his heart. Something was definitely up there, and Joe intended to find out what he planned.

He looked through a hole in the shrubs. The human had gotten a strangely long chair from somewhere and had sat down. He wasn't doing anything that Joe could see. Probably waiting for something or someone.

Well, Joe had time. With a human roaming freely nearby, he wouldn't be able to carry barrels of water into his cellar anyway. So he might as well keep watch on him.

~~

Joe woke up to something hitting his head _hard_. "What the hell?"

He opened his eyes, realizing that even though he was outside, he hadn't fallen asleep in his rocking chair. Right, he'd been watching the human. That was when another stone hit him. This time he knew where it had come from and turned around angrily, hands going to his pockets, where he had the protective runes.

But what he saw was Fergus and Flynn peeking around from behind a tree. He was about to shout at them for hitting him with _stones_ , reminding them that, unlike them, he could feel pain, when he saw that their faces weren't full of mischief. They looked fearful, in fact, and with Joe's eyesight sharpening, he realized that they weren't really looking at him either but rather...

He slowly turned around.

The human stood a stone's throw away, carrying something like a post in a vaguely threatening manner. His face wasn't aggressive, though. He actually looked a bit fearful. Joe still took the rune stones out of his pocket.

"Oh, hey, don't!" the human said, lifting his hand in defense, ready to shield his face.

"I wasn't going to throw them," Joe groused. First of all, it would defeat the purpose of the rune stones. Second, he didn't _hit sentient beings with stones_ , not even humans.

"Right, good," the human said, lowering his hand. "I also wasn't..." he continued, then seemed to realize he was still holding the post, "I mean I won't." He set down the post, which actually unfolded into three legs and could stand on its own like that. The human lifted his hands, now free of a weapon.

At least any that Joe could see. He still didn't trust him.

The human put on an awkward smile and inched nearer.

"Don't come closer," Joe warned him. He was still lying on the ground, pretty much defenseless if he didn't manage to cast the rune stones.

"I just want to talk to you," the human said, taking another step.

It was close enough for Joe not to wait any longer. He moved the stones together and vanished from the sight of the human.

"Holy shit," the human said, blue eyes becoming huge. "How did you do that?"

Joe rolled out of the way, glad that in this state he wouldn't leave any trail. He got up and took a few steps to the side, watching in silence as the human walked closer to his original position.

"I can't believe you just... Are you still here?" he asked, looking around even as he kept walking. When he reached the spot where Joe had been sleeping, he crouched down and felt the spot with his hand, which was empty now, of course. "I would really just like to talk to you," he said in no direction in particular. "You don't have to be afraid."

Joe snorted inwardly. He wasn't afraid of humans. He was afraid of what they did to the world around them. Even though this one maybe wasn't as bad as some. He still wasn't going to sit down with him and have a chat.

The human stood up straight, looking around, and waited for a long moment. "I guess you know where to find me if you change your mind," he said. "If you can hear me. If not, then I'm just talking to myself, which I'd say is crazy, but after seeing tiny little dwarves with a craving for chocolate and a grown man vanishing into thin air, I think that's the least of my problems."

He didn't even need to take a breath to say it. And dwarves? What the hell?

Joe frowned as he watched him go. The human was definitely strange. Up close, he looked quite shapely from behind. Not that Joe was much into the aesthetics of things. But he hadn't been around beings that were of generally the same size and shape as he was for a while. Joe shook his head. He'd _never_ felt the need to be around humans just to be able to look at them. And he certainly wasn't going to stick around because of that now.

He didn't return to his hut either, though, keeping his eyes on the human.

~~

As Joe kept watch, he saw the human setting up more of his gifts, looking around him every now and then as if he expected Joe to pop back into existence in front of his eyes. In fact, the cast no longer kept Joe invisible to human eyes, but of course the human didn't know that. Joe was back to hiding behind shrubs—different ones this time.

He gave Fergus and Flynn a half-hearted warning not to get near the human, but if they weren't afraid before, they certainly weren't now that they'd watched him interact with Joe.

In fact, they didn't even try to hide when taking their gifts. Joe could see the human watching them. He reminded himself that there wasn't really anything the human could _do_ to them, but he was still tense. Communicating with humans was _always_ a bad idea.

But Flynn and Fergus didn't care. When the human set up a few gifts on the table in front of his tent and sat down in the long chair next to it, it was a pretty obvious invitation for them to come closer and talk with him. Which of course the two had to take.

Joe directed another flying ear to be able to hear what they said.

"We're not dwarves," Flynn said from where she had climbed onto the table.

"What are these?" Fergus asked, stuffing another gift lump in his mouth and handing the wrapper to Flynn, who took it happily.

The human's eyes went a bit wide, but then he seemed to relax or force himself to do so and answered. "They're pralines." At Fergus' blank look, he tried to clarify. "Chocolate?"

"Hmm. Whatever it's called, it's very good. Can you get us more?" Fergus asked.

"Uhm, I think I could," the human said.

"Oh yes," Flynn piped up. "They're so shiny. Please get more for us."

"I will," the human said, sitting up straight and leaning closer so that he could lean his arms on the table. "I don't want to be impolite, but _what_ are you, if not dwarves?"

"We're leprechauns," Fergus said.

A laugh escaped from the human's mouth. It sounded slightly hysterical. "Oh God, I really am going crazy."

"Don't worry. Humans usually don't come here. And they don't bring gifts, so we mostly hide," Flynn said, coming closer to pat him on the shoulder.

"You're real," the human said, watching her in wonder.

"Of course we are!" Fergus said.

Flynn took a step back and looked at the human. "Are you all right?" she asked.

The human snorted. "Am I... I guess so," he said, laughing. He looked at the two leprechauns for a moment, then his expression turned thoughtful. "If you are real, which you are," he said, heading off the protest Fergus was about to make, "then what about the... your friend?" the human asked, pointing vaguely towards the direction where Joe had fallen asleep. Damn.

"You mean Joe?" Flynn asked.

"You have names?" the human asked.

"Of course," Flynn said. "I'm Flynn."

"I'm Fergus. What's your name?"

"Uhm, my name is David. David Hewlett," he said, sounding a bit puzzled about making their formal introduction. Joe guessed he wasn't used to meeting chatty leprechauns.

"You have two names?" Flynn asked.

"Three actually. My second name is Ian. David Ian Hewlett."

"Three names!" Flynn said.

"You can call me David," the human said. After a moment, his expression turned curious. "So, _Joe_ is a friend of yours?"

Joe groaned inwardly. Of course the human had to be more interested in him.

"Yes," Fergus said.

"Uhm, we met earlier, but I think we got off on the wrong foot. Some of that might have been my fault, what with wielding that really very inadequate but possibly still somewhat threatening tripod... But maybe you could convince him that I'm a nice guy and that we could talk, like _we_ are talking now," the human said, gesturing between himself and Fergus and Flynn.

"Joe thinks you want to kill him," Flynn said matter-of-factly.

"I don't!" the human said, aghast.

Joe cursed. Okay, enough was enough. He stepped up from behind the shrubs and approached them. The human didn't notice him coming closer, so Joe said, "I _don't_ think that you want to kill me."

The human turned and looked at him with wide eyes. He didn't say anything.

"At least not you specifically. But I know humans in general. And they kill," Joe said.

"I wouldn't hurt a fly," the human said. "I didn't mean that literally," he added hastily, looking at Flynn and Fergus, then back to Joe. "I might have killed a few actually. And spiders. I'm not a fan of spiders, but that's hardly..." he trailed off at the sight of Joe glowering. "I'm sorry," he said. "I guess you're all, uhm, one with nature and everything. I do respect animals. I have a dog! He's staying with my sister at the moment. I really... I would never hurt _you_ ," he said earnestly, looking at Joe. "Or them," he added, nodding towards Flynn and Fergus.

It wasn't like he could, but Joe saw no reason to inform David of that.

"You really have nothing to fear from me," the human concluded.

"It's not _you_ I'm afraid of," Joe said pointedly.

"Oh," David said. "I won't... I won't tell anyone. Not that they'd believe me anyway." Joe gave him another glare. "I won't," the human reassured him. "I know that humans can be... I'll keep your existence safe."

Joe might not have much trust in humanity as a whole, but those words were exactly what he needed to hear. And most importantly, he believed that David had spoken them from his heart. Joe relaxed and came closer.

David got up from his chair, smiling tentatively. "I'm David."

"I know," Joe said.

David eyes widened. "You can't read minds, can you?"

"I listened to you," Joe said. The human was weird. As if it were possible to read minds.

"Oh," the human said, sounding almost disappointed. "Uhm. What are you, if I may ask?"

"They used to call us elves."

"Elves?!" the human asked. He leaned sideways a bit. "Oh, now I see it. The ears are a bit..."

Joe touched the tip of his ear protectively. Just because his ears weren't as strangely round as that of most humans... He harrumphed.

"Not that they're not nice," David added. "They're very... uhm." He swallowed, turning a slight shade of red.

"What are you doing here?" Joe asked, because it seemed pointless to talk about his ears.

"I'm shooting a documentary about animals. Squirrels to be specific."

"You're shooting squirrels?!" Joe asked, outraged.

"No! I'm... One second, let me show you." The human walked over to his tent and came back a moment later with a flat shiny board in his hand. He set it down on the table and opened up what appeared to be a lid. Flynn and Fergus stood next to it to be able to see, so Joe stepped closer to David.

Something happened on the inside of the lid, and after a moment Joe saw moving pictures of animals. It looked like some kind of bull mounting another. He looked at David.

"When I say shooting, I mean making a film, like this," he said, pointing at the lid. "This was about the same-sex behavior of the Bison bison, the American bison."

Joe just looked at David. He still didn't know what point exactly David was trying to make and what he really did.

"We make documentaries to learn about various animals. We observe and document their behavior. And same-sex behavior is something that I... Do you have any idea what I'm talking about?" David asked.

Joe had gotten the part about watching and learning. "What do you mean by same-sex behavior?"

"Sex as in male or female, like they are. I think," David said, pointing at Fergus and Flynn. Then he picked out his stone, only up close Joe could see that it wasn't really a stone but similar to the flat thing with that 'documentary'. David held it up, displaying someone who looked a bit like him. "See, this is my sister. She's female. Except for the ears, you look human. I thought you'd... aren't there any female elves?" he asked.

"I understand what you mean," Joe said instead of answering the question. He'd observed animals over the years. Males and females. David apparently observed cases where animals of the same sex behaved like animals of different sexes usually did. Which, truthfully, wasn't a very interesting topic to Joe. But at least now he knew why David was here. To observe squirrels. Which was unthreatening enough. Since he trusted David to keep his word and not send anyone after them, there was no reason to stay any longer. "I'll leave you to observe," Joe said and turned.

"What? But we hardly talked. You didn't tell me anything about yourself," David said.

"I need to take care of my liquids," Joe only said and went on his way. He turned back once before he went over the hill and saw David standing there, still looking after him.

~~

The next morning Joe woke up in his rocking chair once again. He'd managed to remember the floating spell, so he'd been able to make a new set of barrels with base of the liquid in his cellar without having to do the heavy lifting.

He checked on the base and then contemplated whether to go and take his water board to the beach or maybe collect some leaves for his pipe. In the end he did both.

Shortly after he returned to his hut that evening, he saw Flynn and Fergus skipping down the hill happily. He hoped this meant they hadn't gotten into his cellar while he was gone. Otherwise he might have to capture them and find a way to destroy some of those shiny gifts in front of their eyes.

"David's been asking about you," Flynn said without preamble when they reached him.

Joe squirmed. He didn't know why the human couldn't leave him alone.

"He's talking a lot," Fergus said. "Mostly about you."

"I think he _likes_ you," Flynn added.

"What?" Joe asked. "He doesn't like me. He's just curious. All humans are about things they don't know."

"No, I don't think so. He's not talking as much about us. And leprechauns are much more interesting than elves," Flynn said.

Joe thought that was up to debate but didn't say anything.

"Aaaand," Fergus said, pausing solemnly, "he gave us a gift for you."

Flynn giggled. "He likes you."

Joe glared at her. "So what is the gift?" he asked Fergus.

"Do you think you like David too?" Fergus asked.

"What the hell! You know what? I'm not interested in his gift anyway, so you can take it right back to him," Joe said, turning to find a bag for the leaves he'd collected.

"No! Give it to him," he heard Flynn say.

Fergus jumped in his way and held up a bottle. "We told him about your liquid, so he went into town to—"

"—get us more gifts—" Flynn threw in.

"—get this for you," Fergus finished.

"Hmm," Joe said, taking the bottle from Fergus. He knew that humans brewed their own liquid, though it must have been centuries since he'd last tried it. It had been horrible.

"It tastes nice," Flynn said.

Which meant exactly nothing. Flynn thought sea water tasted nice. He opened the bottle and took a sniff. It smelled not quite as repulsive as he remembered. He picked up a cup and poured a small mouthful of the liquid into it. He swirled the cup, watching the liquid move. It didn't look right. He carefully put the cup to his mouth and started drinking.

It was... drinkable. It was definitely better than what he'd tasted a long time ago, but it was still not as good as even a mediocre batch of his own liquid.

"Do you like it?" Flynn asked.

"No," Joe said curtly.

"What should we tell David?" Fergus asked.

Joe wanted to open his mouth and tell him to tell David that this stuff was nothing compared to his own liquid and to leave him alone, but then he imagined David's disappointment and... Hell, it wasn't even that he cared about what the human thought. Except that it was unacceptable to think that this was good liquid. He'd have to do something about that.

"I'll tell him myself," Joe said, going down in his cellar to get a large flask of the best liquid he still had, which was mediocre but it would have to do.

"You _like_ him," Flynn piped up when he came back out of the cellar.

"I _don't_ ," Joe disagreed. "I just... I'll just show him what real liquid tastes like." Really, that was it. And the reason he went himself, instead of sending the flask via Flynn and Fergus, was that he needed to make sure David understood that this wasn't even the really good liquid. And Joe was bored anyway. Yes, that was the reason.

~~

David looked very happy to see him. "Oh, hey, you got my gift."

"Yeah, they..." Joe looked around, but Flynn and Fergus had skipped away at some point. "I got it."

"Did you like it?" David asked.

"Try this," Joe said, handing over the large flask.

"Uhm, okay," David said. He undid the top and took a small sip. "Oh, this is..." He took another larger sip. "This is great," he said.

"No, it's not. This is liquid that's only just good enough not to be thrown away," Joe explained.

"Oh. Thanks anyway," David said.

"I want the flask back," Joe said.

"Of course." David handed it over, but Joe pushed it back.

"No, you can go ahead and drink it. I just want the flask back." It was a pain to make new ones.

"Uhm, okay, but only if you'll join me," David said. His blue eyes looked hopeful.

Joe hadn't had any liquid in a while, and even though this wasn't the really good stuff, it was nice enough. Plus, he'd come here to have David experience what real liquid tasted like. "All right," he said, taking the flask and swallowing a few gulps before handing it back to David.

"Maybe we should sit down," David suggested. "I have a cot in the tent. And I could show you a few things, and maybe we could talk?"

Joe shrugged. David smiled at him and entered the tent. Joe followed him.

~~

David really liked to talk. He got the flat thing out again—he called it a computer—and showed Joe pictures of the Earth.

"I've been to many places all over the planet when shooting—I mean making documentaries. And this is this area here. See, this is where we are right now. Hmm, there is no sign of your hut. Flynn and Fergus mentioned it, but I can't see it."

"I made it invisible from above. When the large birds started to fly. Though they don't come often," Joe said from the cot, where he was sitting on.

David was sitting at a little table in the tent. "Large birds? You mean planes? Uhm, like this?" He did something on the computer thing and showed Joe a picture.

"Yeah, those. Figured they were human made," Joe said, taking another swig from the flask before handing it back to David.

David took a sip. "And you can just make things invisible? Is that what you did with yourself the other day, when we first met?"

"It's not a terribly difficult cast," Joe said.

David snorted. "I guess not for an elf." He turned back to the computer. "See, this is the next village. It's really not very far. Don't you ever go there?"

"Why would I?" Joe asked. He was feeling pleasantly warm from the liquid.

"Curiosity?" David asked back. "I know you think humans are into killing things, but in my experience... Well, you can make yourself invisible. And honestly, even without doing so, with a more modern set of clothes you'd pass as a human. The ears are not _too_ bad, and it's not as if people will even consider that you could be an elf. You could _live_ as a human if you wanted to, have friends, a relationship. Uhm, that is, assuming everything down there works the same. Since you don't seem to age naturally, I'm not sure reproduction is even a concern." David watched him, turning slightly red, then turned to take another large swig from the flask.

Joe wasn't sure what the hell he was talking about anyway. Down there? "Do you mean this?" he asked, opening up his pants and pulling out his appendage.

David spat out the liquid in his mouth all over the tent floor. He stared at Joe.

"So is it the same?" Joe asked, taking his appendage in his hand.

David's mouth opened. His eyes were fixed on Joe's appendage.

Joe looked at David down there. It did seem like he had an appendage too, because his pants were beginning to tent. Weird.

"Oh God," David only said, finally tearing his gaze away and taking a long, long swig from the flask.

Hmm. Well, Joe had shown him what he looked like down there. He tucked his appendage back in and closed his pants. "Leave something for me," Joe said when it didn't look like David was going to stop.

David got out of the chair, shifting, presumably because his pants were too tight now down there. "Here," he said, handing the flask back to Joe.

Joe took it. He saw David watching him intently. He also didn't look too steady on is feet. "Sit down," Joe said, shifting on the cot without really thinking about it.

David sat down heavily next to him. "Wow, this stuff is a lot harder than it tastes like."

Joe grinned and took a gulp before handing the flask over to David, their hands brushing as he did so.

~~

Joe woke up, feeling very relaxed. Though something was pressing against his thigh. He opened his eye to see David lying half on top of him on the narrow cot. And what was pressing into his thigh was probably David's appendage. He'd never gotten around to showing it to Joe, but Joe was fairly certain that had to be it. He moved his hand between them to cup David down there. There was definitely something there!

David moaned into Joe's side.

Joe pulled his hand away. He didn't want to hurt him. Maybe human appendages were more sensitive than his.

But David mumbled, "No," and pulled Joe's hand back onto his appendage. Then he moved Joe's hand up and down on it.

Hmmm. Joe could do that. He rubbed the appendage through David's tight pants while David turned his head and looked up at Joe. He was breathing a bit more heavily now. Joe continued to move his hand over the appendage, and David began to squirm. He pulled his shirt up, revealing a white belly, and Joe realized that his pants had to be getting too tight to be comfortable. And hey, it was only fair if he got to see David's appendage too.

He opened David's pants, and David moved and pushed down what he wore underneath to reveal an appendage that looked similar to Joe's. Except that it was hard and redder. And it stood up. Joe's never did that. Joe took the appendage in hand, and David moaned again, "Yes," and Joe recognized that it was a good moan. David seemed to like what he was doing.

Joe moved his hand over David's appendage, trying to do different things to different spots, letting David's moans of approval guide him.

"Oh yes, yes, please," David groaned, and Joe kept at it, watching some drops of fluid emerge from the tip. This was weird. Was David relieving himself of the liquid like this? Though the stuff looked different. David started moving along with him, panting one harsh breath after another until suddenly he stiffened and spurt after spurt of that white fluid shot from David's appendage.

Joe couldn't remember his appendage _ever_ doing something like that, and from the long drawn out moan that David gave, it had to be memorable. In a good way.

David relaxed after the spurts had stopped. Joe had removed his hands in surprise when it had started. The appendage didn't look as hard anymore. Joe tentatively reached out to touch.

"No, please," David said. "Sensitive."

"Okay," Joe said, watching David as he lay on the cot, still panting, one arm covering his eyes. This was definitely one of the more peculiar things Joe had done in his long life. Though it hadn't been bad. David had certainly liked it a lot, and that somehow gave Joe a fuzzy feeling in his chest that had nothing to do with last night's liquid.

Eventually David removed the arm from his face and looked at Joe, smiling awkwardly. "You've never done this before, have you?"

"No," Joe said truthfully.

"I shouldn't have asked you to do it," David said.

"You enjoyed it, right?" Joe asked.

"Very, very much," David said with feeling.

"Then why not ask?" Joe said with a shrug. It wasn't as if he had forced Joe to do something he didn't want to do. It had been a fascinating experience. "I've never seen anything like it. Mine doesn't do this—ever."

"Oh," David said, looking disappointed. "I guess it's not necessary for reproduction. What a shame."

Joe nodded. He should probably go. He didn't have a reason to stay. He'd drunk with David all night until they'd fallen asleep. His mission was done. "I'll leave you to making your documentary," he said, climbing over David to get out of bed. "You can keep the rest of the liquid." They hadn't finished the whole flask.

"But... Will you come back?" David asked. "For the flask," he added when Joe didn't say anything.

Joe knew that it was just an excuse. He had other flasks in his hut. Still he said, "Maybe. For the flask," before smiling at David and leaving the tent.

~~

Joe went to the beach for a while, but the waves weren't the best, so he went home again.

His thoughts kept returning to David. And when the hell had he started thinking of him as that instead of 'the human'? Joe hadn't been around other beings for a long time. Flynn and Fergus' infrequent visits were mostly a source of annoyance, though he had to admit that he'd probably miss them if they moved away.

But he hadn't missed talking to beings, either elves or humans. A long, long time ago he hadn't hidden from humans. Humans and elves had lived alongside each other in peace. Though Joe remembered this more as a legend he'd been told rather than actually remembering interacting with humans. Or elves for that matter. He thought that he'd probably had something like a family at some point. He vaguely remembered not being the only elf around, though he couldn't remember any faces or names.

The last representations he'd had, _physical_ memories, had been destroyed in the fire two hundred years ago. All that was left was the memory of a memory of something. He didn't remember enough to miss anything.

And yet, something in David had stirred the memories of companionship, of what it was like not to always be alone.

Joe shook his head. He was being ridiculous. David was a _human_. He was doing his documentary thing and then he'd be gone, and Joe could continue to live his life in peace as he'd done for the last couple hundred of years.

He checked on his base of liquid in the cellar and got a flask of the mediocre stuff. Even though it wasn't the best, it still left him with a pleasant buzz.

As he fell asleep, he remembered a different kind of buzz, that flutter in his chest when he'd taken David's appendage in hand and made him feel good.

~~

Joe woke up in his rocking chair the next day and worked the kinks out of his back. He got up and stepped aside to relieve himself of last night's liquid. When he was done, he looked down at his appendage. It really did look like what David had down there. So maybe... maybe his appendage could do the same, and he had just never bothered trying.

He wrapped his hand around and started rubbing it, but it didn't really do anything. It stiffened maybe a tiny bit. Hmmm. Well, maybe they _were_ different even though they looked the same.

Joe certainly didn't think of himself as just a human with pointy ears and different abilities even though elves and humans looked very much alike in all other respects.

He left his hut to get a head start on collecting the ingredients for making the perfect liquid. As he walked around, he thought about how David would like the really good stuff. He'd loved the mediocre liquid that Joe had brought him. Joe could only imagine how he'd react to the perfect variation.

The thought made him smile.

When he returned to his hut shortly before noon, he caught his own gaze being drawn towards the hill again and again. He had no good reason to visit David again. Except for his flask. Yes! He could go and collect that.

And if David wasn't done with it yet... well, Joe could come back the next day. Or the one after that. The flask was a good one, one of the largest he had. He wanted it back.

Really, this had nothing to do with wanting to see David again.

Joe went on his way up the hill.

~~

David was very happy to see him. "Getting your... flask?" he asked playfully.

"Are you done with it?" Joe asked in return.

"Not quite," David said. "I'd like to hold on to it for a while longer if that's okay with you," he added, though something in his voice told Joe that he might not be talking about the flask. But he was really out of practice reading into the meaning behind words. And talking to Flynn and Fergus didn't require it.

"How is your documentary going?" Joe asked him instead of answering his implied question.

"Not so good. The squirrels seem to be hiding. I've got footage from the first few days but after that... nothing."

"Flynn and Fergus might have scared them away. The squirrels will be back in the few days," Joe told him.

"I haven't seen Flynn and Fergus for a while," David said. "Are they all right?"

"They're always all right," Joe said, snorting. "They'll be gone for a while, but they always return eventually." As an afterthought he added, "Though you might not be here anymore."

"Who knows," David said. "I might stick around for a bit." He cleared his throat. "I hope things are going well with your, uh, liquids."

"As long as Fergus and Flynn keep away, they'll be fine. If you're still around when the batch is done, I'll bring some over," Joe said.

"That sounds great," David said, smiling at him.

They looked at each other for long moment. Joe's thoughts flashed back to that morning in the tent. He wondered if David would like to do that again. But he hadn't asked, so maybe it wasn't something that humans did very often. He _had_ said that his appendage was sensitive afterwards. Maybe he had to wait for some time to do it again.

"Do you want to watch some of my old documentaries?" David asked, ending the silence between them.

Joe wasn't interested in particular, but he found that he didn't want to leave just yet either. So he said, "Okay."

~~

Joe didn't really watch the documentary that David had set up to run on his computer thing. Instead, he looked over to David, who sat next to him on the cot, talking about 'shooting' what was just happening in the documentary.

Joe only understood half of what he was saying, especially when he begun to talk about the human things used for this kind of 'shooting'. But Joe still liked to listen to David's voice. He looked so enthusiastic about it all. He also had a weird sense of humor about how much he worried about things going wrong.

Joe caught himself smiling and laughing along with David. "You are weird," he once told him.

"I, uh, I guess I am. I can't really say anything about you. You're the only elf I know. And if you were human, I guess you'd be... cool. But still nice. And, uh," David let his gaze travel down Joe's body, then back up again. He swallowed and returned his attention to the computer.

When the documentary was over, there was another long silence between them. Until David's stomach growled. "I should probably eat something. Do you want to join me?"

Joe made a face. "Nah. I don't like food."

David looked surprised. "You don't eat? I thought with the liquid... So you have to drink but not eat?"

"I don't _have_ to drink. But I can. I _can_ also eat, but the way the stuff comes back out is just nasty. Relieving the liquid is okay. But that filth from eating?" Joe shook his head and shuddered. "But I guess you _have_ to eat."

"Yes. And I have to admit I like it. Despite the, uh, filth. It's just the way it works for humans."

"Well, I'm glad I'm not a human," Joe said.

David only gave him a long look. "Would you still like to join me?" he asked eventually when he got up.

"Why not?" Joe said. It wasn't as if he had anything better to do.

David prepared something in the little rolling hut, talking about food he liked and strange things he'd eaten in other areas of the world.

He took his meal outside when he was done. They sat down on the table in front of the tent, and David kept up a running commentary of everything he ate.

"You know what? I think I'll go replenish," Joe said when he had enough and David wouldn't stop even after Joe had pointed out that he wasn't all that interested in hearing about food.

"Replenish?" David asked between bites.

"To rejuvenate," Joe said. "If I don't do it, I feel weak. It's filling me with energy. Actually, I think it might be similar to what your food does for you."

"How does it work?" David asked.

Joe frowned. "It just does," he said with a shrug. "I lie down in the grass and... replenish."

"Could I film you?" David asked. "I won't show it to anyone. I promise. I told you I'd never show any of my footage of you or Fergus and Flynn to anyone. Not if you don't want me to, and I know you don't. I would just love to capture it."

David's voice held that same earnestness he had when talking about his documentaries, so Joe nodded.

~~

Joe ignored the camera after David had set it up and closed his eyes. He put his hands in the grass, feeling the energy as it traveled into his body filling him with what he needed to survive.

He was never aware of time passing when he replenished, but when he opened his eyes, David still stood next to the camera as he had when Joe had first closed them. He was staring down at Joe.

"That was amazing," David said.

Joe didn't know what it looked like from the outside, but he was willing to take David's word for it. It wasn't as if he had a chance to ever see it. Unless... "Have you ever tried it?" he asked.

David gave him a look. "Are you joking? That's not some elf trick you're pulling on every human, is it?"

"I told you I avoid humans as a rule," Joe said. "And no, I'm not joking."

"It won't work!" David said as if it should be obvious.

"Have you ever tried it?" Joe asked.

"Of course not. It _can't_ work!"

"But if you never tried it, how do you know?" Joe insisted.

"Are you sure you're not joking?" David asked, looking a bit wary.

Joe had to laugh. "Are humans always so suspicious? Come on," he said, patting the spot of grass next to him.

David hesitated for another moment, then lay down in the grass next to Joe. He looked stiff and uncomfortable. Joe rolled over and moved so that he was on all fours above David and better able to see how tense David was all over. David swallowed audibly.

"You need to relax," Joe told him.

"That might be difficult," David said, sounding a bit strained. At Joe's frown he added, "With you above me like that."

"Why?" Joe asked.

"Well, if you're like that above me, my mind goes to places that might be considered the opposite of relaxing," David said, flushing a cute shade of red.

It reminded Joe of what they'd done in the tent. He looked down David's body and sure enough, his pants seemed to be tented again down there. Joe moved his hand down to rub him again.

"Oh God," David breathed, closing his eyes.

"Is it okay?" Joe said, not moving his hand. "Or still too sensitive?"

David opened his eyes. "No, it's good, better than good. Are you sure you want to do this again?"

Joe's answer was to start rubbing David's growing appendage. David squirmed beneath him. Joe opened up his pants. The appendage seemed eager enough to get out. He took it in his hand and smiled at David.

David looked up at him with parted lips. "Can I..." he started.

"Can you what?" Joe asked, beginning to slowly move his hand up and down on David's appendage.

"Can I kiss you?" David asked.

"What's kissing?" Joe asked, not stopping his movement.

"Oh God," David said. "You are— Kissing is... It's this," he said, propping himself up on his lower arms until their mouths nearly touched.

Joe vaguely recalled that. People moving their mouths together. Sure, he could do that. He closed the distance between them.

Their lips met, and for a moment Joe wondered why people would do this, why David had asked to do this, but then David angled his face a bit and started moving his mouth minutely. It was... nice. Joe felt his own lips responding, moving against David's, and suddenly that flutter in his chest was back.

David moved one hand up and into Joe's hair, opening his mouth up further. Joe moved his hand away from David's appendage to be able to lower himself down, closer towards him. This was better than nice. It was really good. They kept kissing, and Joe lowered himself onto David, who groaned into his mouth when he settled on his appendage.

Joe moved up enough to get his hand around it again, stroking it as he'd done before. David moved up into his hand, panting and kissing Joe. He moved a hand under Joe's shirt which made Joe feel tingly all over. He pushed his tongue into Joe's mouth, and instead of being weird, it was fantastic.

Joe tried to remember which parts of his appendage David liked to have touched the most, but it was getting a bit hard to think. David's mouth and hands were very distracting, and the sounds he made were stirring something in Joe's heart.

They kept moving, a bit uncoordinated and clumsy, but it was still somehow amazing. David started to get even more tense, sounding more desperate, until his appendage started shooting the white fluid again as he convulsed. Joe kept stroking him, waiting for the sign that he should stop, and when David started to squirm again, he let go.

"Thank you," David panted. "Thank you, thank you, thank you. That was... I don't think I have words to describe what that was."

Joe just looked down at his flushed face. He looked beautiful. His blue eyes were gazing up at Joe in wonder and happiness. David smiled, then laughed and pulled Joe down next to him. As he settled close to David, they both realized that Joe's own appendage seemed to be stiff.

"I thought it didn't do that," David said, looking down there, then up at Joe's face.

"It never has before," Joe said. He hadn't even noticed it while he'd rubbed David.

"Can I... Can I try to make it do the same as mine does?" David asked hesitantly.

Joe only thought a second about how good it seemed to be for David. "Yes," he said, a bit breathless himself.

David smiled widely, then grinned. "I think you're going to like it—a lot," he said before rolling Joe onto his back.

Joe was curious about how it would feel. There was something of a buzz running through his body, a tingle on his skin and that flutter in his heart. But none of it had made him want to moan like David, so he figured there was more.

David leaned over him and unbuttoned Joe's pants. His own pants were still open.

"We could undress," Joe suggested.

"That's a great idea," David said, "I'll just count on nobody choosing today for a little trip into the country."

"Nobody ever comes here," Joe said.

"I'm not nobody," David said.

Joe thought he was trying to be funny. "No. You are a body."

David laughed and pulled his shirt off, as well as pushing off his pants, underthings, shoes and whatever else he was wearing. Human clothing seemed to be very complicated. Joe only got out of his pants and shirt and slipped off his sandals. His appendage was standing out. It was very strange to see it do that.

David took it lightly in his hand and directed Joe to lie back down.

Joe watched as David slowly stroked him. It felt good. When he started to tighten his hold on Joe's appendage it got even better. The pressure seemed to _do_ something to it, making it fuller, harder. It also increased the tingle and buzz in Joe's body.

"You like this," David said.

"Uhum," Joe only said, beginning to feel a bit restless. It felt good, great even, but he wanted more, even if he didn't quite know what. His hips started lifting up, pushing into David's hand.

David smiled and suddenly tightened his grip even more and increased the speed of his strokes.

A groan escaped from Joe's mouth. This was unlike anything he'd ever experienced.

"Wait till I do this," David said.

Before Joe could ask what he meant, David moved back and down and took Joe's appendage in his mouth. Joe thought that was such a strange thing to do, but then David started sucking and it wasn't strange but great, better than great. Joe wanted to start thrusting into David's mouth, but David's hands held him firmly by his hips. But he still seemed to know what Joe needed, taking more of his appendage inside, moving up and down on it and doing things with his tongue that Joe couldn't have even imagined.

David took his appendage in his hand again, holding it firmly and moving up and down in short hard strokes while his mouth concentrated on the end of Joe's appendage, licking and sucking and— Joe groaned loudly. His whole body was tense as if he'd turned to stone. Then David sped up the movements of his hand and sucked especially hard, and Joe started to convulse as pleasure shot through his whole body.

This was probably the part where he was spurting the white fluid, but he couldn't see because David was greedily swallowing it all.

After the convulsions had subsided, having David's mouth on his appendage felt too intense. "Please," Joe said, now understanding what David had meant about it becoming sensitive. David moved away, giving the end of Joe's appendage one more lick.

Joe's body shuddered and not in a bad way. David lay down next to him, putting an arm over Joe's chest. Joe was still catching his breath. He felt as if he'd been flying on an especially high wave with his water board. Only better.

David played with the hair on his chest, watching Joe as he slowly came down from that amazing feeling. Once Joe's breathing wasn't quite as heavy anymore, David asked, "So?"

"Trying out new things is a really good idea," Joe had to admit in this instance.

David smiled self-satisfied. "Though I still can't replenish," he added wistfully.

Joe laughed.

~~

Joe visited David every day after that.

They spent time talking, watching squirrels, and 'having sex' as David called it. Joe had had no idea what kinds of things he could do with his appendage. He did try them alone again in his hut, but it didn't quite seem to work without David.

David made a representation of him with a camera, a different kind that made still photos as David explained to him. He then 'printed' that photo out.

"Good for remembering," Joe had said.

"Yes," David had agreed.

"You could... You could make one of yourself," Joe had said hesitantly. He hadn't wanted to outright ask, but David had understood. He'd given Joe a representation of himself the next day. Joe had taken it back home to his hut.

"Do you want to see where I live?" Joe asked him one day, realizing that David had never seen his hut.

"If you'll let me," David answered.

"Sure," Joe said and smiled. He took David's hand, and they walked up the hill and down the other side towards his hut.

Once they were there, Joe stopped and asked David, "What do you think?"

David turned to him. "Of what?" he asked, looking around.

"Oh wait, I forgot." Right. He'd cast the invisibility runes when he'd first met David. It seemed like an eternity ago.

He was still holding David's hand, so he tugged on it and led him closer until they came across the threshold.

"Wow," David said, taking a step back again. He looked up at the roof and took another few steps back so that he could see the hut as a whole.

"I built it myself," Joe said proudly.

"Yeah, I can see that," David said.

"Do you want to go inside?" Joe asked.

"Uhm," David said but didn't make a move. So Joe tugged on his hand again and dragged him closer, though at the threshold David made him stop. He put his head inside the door and looked around.

"What?" Joe asked.

"I don't want to be insulting or anything, but are you sure this is safe? I mean this looks like it could literally fall apart at any moment," David said.

"It's been standing for two hundred years," Joe said.

"Well, yes, but that was just you. What if having two people inside will make it all break down?" David asked, still looking around as if the ceiling was out to get him. Joe had enough of it and simply pulled on his arm roughly. "Hey!" David stumbled inside.

"See, it's still standing," Joe said.

"Yes, yes," David said. He took a quick look around the hut, which wasn't really more than Joe's bedroom and a storage room, and rushed out again.

Joe rolled his eyes at him. "You worry too much," he said.

"Yes, I do, but I'm not going to change, I'm afraid," David said.

Joe thought that he didn't really want David to change. He leaned forward and kissed him.

"Have you ever considered going elsewhere?" David asked after they'd pulled apart.

"Like where?" Joe asked.

"I don't know. The world is very large. There are many places."

"Without humans?" Joe asked.

"That might be a problem," David conceded. "Though humans aren't all bad, are they?" he asked.

Joe looked at David. They were still holding hands. "No, not all of them apparently," he said, squeezing David's hand for a moment.

~~

David made good progress with his documentary once the squirrels returned. Joe was happy for him, but at the same time he found himself getting restless at the thought of David's work coming to an end.

He enjoyed spending time with him. He enjoyed the stories of the world that David told him, and he enjoyed how David listened when Joe talked about nature and his past, what little of it he could remember.

When he went home to his hut, he found himself missing David. And part of him feared the moment that David would leave.

It was ridiculous. He didn't like humans around. They always meant trouble.

But the problem was that David wasn't just a human any longer. He was David.

~~

"I, uh, I'm done with shooting the material that I need," David said one day. "I have more than I need actually."

They both knew what it meant. "You'll go," Joe said.

"Yes, I... I have to get to my studio to edit everything together and do post-production," David said.

Joe had no idea what he was talking about, but it didn't really matter. The only thing that mattered was that David would have to leave him. "When?" Joe asked.

"I told them I'd return the camping trailer within the day," he said.

So not much time left. They stood together and stared at each other. There really wasn't anything that Joe could say. So he just pulled David into his arms and kissed him.

They started undressing and lay down in the grass. David kissed his face, his cheeks, the tip of his ears. Then he made his way down Joe's neck, mapping his whole body with his lips. Joe tried not to think about how much he'd miss this. There was no point in lamenting what he couldn't have. He'd lived alone for hundreds of years and he'd been fine. And he'd be fine again.

But it was hard to believe that, when David touched every part of his body, making Joe's skin tingle and his heart soar. Eventually, David moved away to get the slick stuff he used to prepare Joe to take his appendage inside of him.

Feeling David inside him or being inside David had been more of those experiences that he wouldn't ever forget. He would get to experience it one last time, and he savored every moment of it as David pushed a finger inside him. He took his time preparing Joe, looking at him with open blue eyes.

When he was finally done, he moved Joe's legs up and Joe's thighs on his shoulders before positioning his appendage at Joe's entrance.

Feeling David push into him, filling him, made Joe's heart skip a beat. It was breathtaking. He took a gulp of air as David continued pressing into him until he was as far inside Joe as he could get.

Joe listened to the beating of his heart, which sounded incredibly loud in his chest. He knew what was going to come, but it still caught him by surprise every single time. The onslaught of sensation as David pulled back and thrust back in was still unfathomable to Joe. David moved back and forth inside him, angling his body in different ways until he touched something inside Joe that set him afire from within.

A desperate noise escaped from Joe's lips, and then David started thrusting in a strong hard rhythm, pushing Joe higher and higher, faster and faster. His body was a mass of heat and sensation, shaking a bit every time David thrust back in.

Harder and faster. David groaned out his own pleasure, leaning down to kiss Joe even as he kept moving into him again and again and again.

The kiss was wet and wild and breathless, mingled with moans and whimpers as they both raced towards the point of no return.

Then David took Joe's appendage in his hand, and one hard stroke was enough to make Joe shoot spurt after spurt of white fluid onto his stomach and chest.

David followed him, freezing inside Joe and filling him until he couldn't keep upright anymore and collapsed onto Joe.

They lay like that for a long time, even after David's appendage had slipped out of him and the sweat had cooled on their bodies.

"I have to go," David whispered into Joe's chest.

"I know," Joe said, even though what he wanted to say was, "Don't." But there was no way for them. David was a human and belonged in a human world. And Joe didn't.

They moved apart and helped cleaning each other and got dressed. There wasn't much more that David had to pack. Joe helped him.

Then the moment came where they had to say goodbye. "I..." David began.

Joe thought that maybe he would ask him to come with him, so that they'd be together. Joe knew that he didn't belong with humans, but at this point he wasn't sure if he wasn't willing to at least try. But in the end David didn't ask him.

"I'm happy that I met you," David said instead.

"I'm happy too," Joe said, though right this second he wasn't so sure about that. Right this second it almost felt as if he might have been happier if David had never entered his life. But he wouldn't want to miss what they'd had, the experiences that David had shared with him.

"Maybe we'll meet again some day," David said.

Joe didn't think that was very likely. Unless David came back. And he didn't know why he should. There was nothing here. Except a few squirrels. And Joe.

Still, he said, "Maybe."

They kissed one last time, then David stepped into what he called a car and rolled off and out of Joe's life.

~~

Joe went about his day after that. He should be happy, really. He'd neglected collecting ingredients and leaves when he'd spent much of his time with David. And he couldn't remember when he last had a long quiet evening, smoking his pipe. It was better this way.

Only it didn't feel better.

He went flying the waves with his water board, refined his newest batch of liquid to perfection, but somehow it wasn't as good when he couldn't share it with David.

Could he have gotten so used to humans in just such a short time?

When he still felt empty and alone after a few days, he cast an invisibility rune on himself and went into the village. He saw the humans, but he still felt no desire to interact with them. No, he hadn't gotten used to humans. He certainly wasn't missing _humans_.

He missed _David_.

But there was nothing he could do about it.

~~

Joe tried to ignore his feelings, but his mind kept returning to the time with David, and as he was collecting ingredients the next few days, he realized that they weren't for liquid or his other everyday casts, but rather for a longevity cast. It would be useless for him. For a human on the other hand... He stopped what he was doing, shocked by himself, but after distracting himself by making a few protection stones, he thought that there was nothing wrong with practicing casts that he wouldn't necessarily ever use.

He was in the process of anointing some roots with morning dew when he heard Flynn and Fergus running down the hill. He sighed.

They joined him and watched him as he worked.

"You look glum," Flynn commented.

"I'm fine," Joe said.

"You don't _look_ fine," Fergus said.

"Well, I am," Joe said defiantly.

"I think he misses David," Flynn said.

Joe looked at her sharply. "I don't," he lied.

"Really?" Fergus asked.

"Really," Joe confirmed.

"Then I guess he doesn't want to know that David's back," Fergus said to Flynn.

Joe's head snapped up. "He's back?" he asked, feeling short of breath suddenly.

Before Flynn or Fergus could answer, Joe was already on his feet and running up the hill.

Flynn and Fergus followed, chanting, "Joehoe misses David."

~~

David was back with a different rolling hut, but the same tent. He sat in the long chair, looking at his computer, though when Joe approached, he looked up. He didn't seem surprised, but a flush appeared on his cheeks. He was quite possibly the most beautiful thing Joe had ever seen.

"That was fast," David said, smiling at Joe.

"Joe _ran_ ," Flynn said, suddenly appearing behind Joe.

"Bye David. Thanks for the chocolate," Fergus said.

"Yes, thanks," Flynn said, and then they were off and Joe was alone with David.

David set his computer down in the grass and stood up. "I'm back," he said, sounding a bit nervous.

"I see that," Joe said. "But why?"

"Honestly, I didn't want to leave in the first place, but I couldn't just up and leave my life. People paid me in advance for that movie, so I had to finish it. And also... Well, you can literally live on the air around you, but I can't. I need food and preferably a roof over my head, and all of that costs money."

"You'll have to go back," Joe concluded, feeling his heart sinking. He had hoped. He had hoped that David wouldn't just be back, but that he'd _stay_.

"I _thought_ so, but when I asked a friend to check these," David put his hand in his pocket and pulled out one of the lumps that Flynn and Fergus dropped wherever they did some mischief, "he told me that I wouldn't have to worry too much about money. I'm not exactly rich, though if Flynn and Fergus drop by every month that could change. In any case, what's important is that now I don't have to go and earn some money just to be able to visit you for a week."

"You don't?" Joe asked, feeling hope in his chest again.

"No," David said. "I can stay." He still sounded hesitant.

"Do you _want_ to stay?" Joe asked.

"I do, but I wasn't sure if you wanted me around," David said, swallowing audibly.

Joe shook his head and snorted. David could be so weird. "Of course I do," he said, leaning in to kiss David again, but David stopped him by putting a hand on his chest.

"I... I can't stay here like I did before. Frolicking in the grass is fine and well, but I'd like to live in a real house, and no offense, but your hut..."

Joe nodded, not really caring about the insult to his craftsmanship. David was saying that he wanted to live here. He wanted to be with Joe.

"And I'll want people to visit me. My friends and family," David said.

"That's okay," Joe said. He could live with that. He could meet people. As long as they wouldn't stay. As long as he had David to himself most of the time. "I can wear human clothes for them. Or hide."

"Good," David said. But he still didn't sound as happy as Joe thought he should be, as he himself felt. "I'm going to die," he said.

Joe's eyes widened. He looked up and down David's body, but nothing seemed amiss.

"Not now or soon, but eventually. In fifty years or so," David clarified.

Oh that. Joe had known that. "You don't have to," he said.

David frowned, not understanding.

"I could cast a rune for you, slow it down," Joe said.

David looked shocked.

"They'll notice though," Joe added. "Your friends and family." Unless David hid it from them. Joe thought that there might be a cast for that. But in the long run David would have to make a decision. To live with humans as a human or forever with Joe.

"I understand," David said. "I don't have to decide now though, do I?"

"No," Joe assured him, smiling.

"That's good. Because frankly I thought the decision of moving here to be with you was big and life-changing, but _that_..." he moved his hands around to encompass everything and nothing.

Joe laughed. "It's okay. There's no rush. We have time."

"We do," David said, leaning forward.

Together, Joe thought as he closed the distance between them.

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to djaddict for the beta! This was written for the [RPF Big Bang](http://community.livejournal.com/rpf_big_bang/) on LJ.


End file.
